Tape drive offline

[Bob_Peitzke]

This ProLiant DL380-G3 running Windows 2000/SP4 server and BE 9.1 rev 4691 had been getting good backups for a long time, until the other day when it suddenly developed a problem. BE Devices shows the tape drive as offline, and thinks it is a Compaq DAT 20/40, whereas the drive is actually an HP DAT-72, Q1529A.

The HP Array Controller Utility sees the tape drive on the Smart Array 5i controller, as a DAT-36/72 drive. But the tape drive does not show up in Windows Device Manager, unlike on other similar servers.

I've tried in BE/Devices deselecting/reselecting the device in its properties/Configuration, "Enable device for Backup Exec", but it didn't help.  I've also removed & reinserted this hot-swap tape drive, but it didn't make it visible to Dev Mgr or BE/Devices.

I deleted the device in BE/Devices and ran the BE Devices installer, 273853, but it reported "Install Wizard Error / The wizard was interrupted ... ".

I have not rebooted this server yet, as we are a 24/7 production environment. 

Any suggestions?

TIA

Bob Peitzke

IT Manager

Colony Advisors, LLC

Century City, CA, USA

[Ken_Putnam]

Well, if Windows Device Manager doesn't see the drive, BackupExec won't either

Sounds like the drive has failed to me.  One last test would be to schedule some down time and reboot the server.  If Windows doesn't pick it up after that ...

If you have an open PCI slot, I'd also suggest adding a low-end SCSI controller and moving the drive to that.  Veritas/Symantec have always recommended that tape drives NOT be attached to RAID controllers